Fat continuous food products are well known in the art and include, for example, shortenings comprising a fat phase and water-in-oil emulsions such as spreads, butter, kitchen margarines and bakery margarines.
The fat phase of these products usually comprises a mixture of liquid oil (i.e. fat that is liquid at ambient temperature) and fat which is solid at ambient temperatures. The solid fat, also called structuring fat or hardstock fat, serves to structure the fat phase and helps to stabilize the aqueous phase, if present, by forming a fat crystal network.
Shortenings and spreads are commonly produced by a process that encompasses the following steps:                mixing of liquid oil, structuring fat and if present aqueous phase at a temperature at which the structuring fat is fully molten;        cooling the mixture under high shear to induce crystallization of the structuring fat and to create an emulsion (if water is present);        allowing the formation of a fat crystal network to stabilize the resulting emulsion and to impart a degree of firmness;        modification of the crystal network to control firmness, plasticity and water droplet size of the final product.        
These steps are usually conducted in a so called churn process or votator process. The churn process and the votator process are described in the Ullmans Encyclopedia, Fifth Edition, Volume A 16, pages 156-158. The energy consumption of these processes is substantial.
WO 2005/014158 describes a process for the preparation of an edible dispersion comprising oil and structuring agent and one or more of an aqueous phase and/or a solid phase, in which the dispersion is formed by mixing oil, solid structuring agent particles and the aqueous phase and/or the solid phase, wherein the solid structuring agent particles have a microporous structure of submicron size particles. The solid structuring agent particles are produced by preparing a homogeneous mixture of structuring agent and liquefied gas or supercritical gas at a pressure of 5-40 MPa and expanding the mixture through an orifice, under such conditions that a spray jet is formed in which the structuring agent is solidified and micronized.
The structuring agent particles described in WO 2005/014158 offer the advantage that they enable substantial energy savings to be realized in the production of fat-continuous food products such as spreads and shortenings.
The freely settled density of the structuring agent particles according to WO 2005/014158 typically lies in the range of 10-200 g/l. Shipping and storing materials with such a low density is relatively expensive. Hence, there is a need for a structuring agent that combines the advantages of the structuring agent particles of WO 2005/014158 with a substantially higher density.
WO 2006/087092 describes granules comprising:
a) solid micronized lipid powder particles that have a microporous structure; and
b) a liquid;
wherein the granule is an agglomeration of said lipid particles. These granules are produced by spraying a sticky liquid onto micronized fat powder to glue the particles of the fat powder together.